


More Than Two

by bearwonder



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Educational, M/M, Magic AU, Polyamory, i guess, modern day AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:40:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26255797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bearwonder/pseuds/bearwonder
Summary: Sirius Black returns to London after three years. Some things have changed; others haven't.Or, the promised educational fic about polyamory.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 1
Kudos: 15





	1. Prelude

**Author's Note:**

> I began this fic after growing increasingly frustrated with all of the poly representation in fic being stable triads, since that is very different from my experience - and that of most poly people. I have been in a poly relationship for three years and am friends with more than a hundred other poly people, and I wanted to give people like us some representation in fandom. While stable triads definitely exist (though I've never known any myself) and are totally good and valid, I think their overrepresentation in fanfiction feeds unhelpful misconceptions about polyamory as a whole.
> 
> This story was always going to be mostly expository monologuing, but along the way some people expressed interest in this as an educational fic, and once I thought people might actually read it, I figured I should probably add on a chapter or two where I show instead of telling. Those will come at the end, as a reward for getting through all of the exposition :P
> 
> They say that there are as many different ways to practice polyamory as there are poly people, so obviously I won't be speaking to every single person's experience here. Remus's level of knowledge here reflects my own - i.e. familiar with poly through personal experience and perhaps a bit of reading, but by no means an expert researcher on polyamory.
> 
> If you're interested in more resources, I found Eve Rickert and Franklin Veaux's _More Than Two_ to be really useful when navigating the first major change in my primary relationship (though my boyfriend found it somewhat problematic for reasons I forget). I also think my friend's post [Choosing Insecurity](https://knowingless.com/2017/01/15/choosing-insecurity/) is a good way to get some insight into the mindset of people (like me) who have come to see polyamory as the default / obvious choice. Beyond that, well, I've learned most of what I know just from living in a poly community, but I know there are tons of people out there on the internet who write about polyamory. If you have additional suggestions, let me know and I can add them here :)

It’s strange, being back in London, familiar yet alien at the same time. All the little changes that you barely notice when you live somewhere really add up when you’re gone for three years - a new cafe on the corner, an old tree felled, a high-rise blotting out a familiar patch of sky. It leaves Sirius feeling wrong-footed, as if he weren’t already off-kilter enough. 

Fleamont and Euphemia are dead, and he’s a terrible son for only coming back for their funeral when he could have seen them alive any time in the last three years. He’d debated not coming at all. It seemed so meaningless, to come back for them, when they weren’t really there. But no, it was the right time. If he hadn’t come back now, he might have stayed away forever. And he didn’t _want_ to stay away. 

Even now, his feet are carrying him down a path he’s walked a thousand times: the path from the Ministry to his old flat. The path to his strongest reason for returning. The path to Remus.

Of course, Remus could have moved in the last three years, but the farther Sirius walks, the more certain he is that he hasn’t. Remus’s magic is like a lodestone, tugging on something deep inside of him.

He passes his favorite tree - a sugar maple with low limbs perfect for climbing - and a chronically disappointing chippy that he and Remus always ate at anyway because it was so nearby. Which means the flat is just moments away now, and Sirius isn’t ready, but he keeps walking anyway. 

The wards are familiar, clicking and unlocking as Sirius nears. He pauses, resting his head against the door frame and taking a deep breath to steel himself. Then he knocks.

Voices sound from inside the flat, then footsteps.

It isn’t Remus who opens the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Remus, Sirius, a talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally getting to some of the actual content! I really wanted to get this out today so I cut a chapter in half and also didn't even read over this before posting, so please let me know about any errors. Also I have basically never written dialogue ever before in my life, so yeah, I know it could be better. But I figure that in this specific instance, it's really the message that's important; all the form needs to do is not be so terrible that it's distracting.

Benjy Fenwick looks different than Sirius remembers him from Hogwarts. He’s filled out, grown into himself. He looks comfortable in his own skin. Sirius wonders what that’s like.

Sirius had known intellectually that Remus had found someone else – he’d even seen pictures – but to show up at the door of his own flat and be greeted by that person… it’s hard. But he finds that he doesn’t feel any animosity towards this man. Just a deep sense of loss.

“Er, hi,” he says after probably too long a silence. “Is Remus here? I’m… I’m Sirius.”

Benjy’s eyes widen. “Blimey, I thought you looked familiar! Remus, it’s your Sirius!”

Your _Sirius, what does that–_? and then Remus comes around the corner, and Sirius forgets for a moment where he is, when he is, because that’s the sight of coming home at the end of the day, and Remus kissing him in the foyer as he shucks his coat. 

“Moony, I… sorry for just barging in like this, I should have said something.”

Remus laughs softly, affectionately, and Merlin, Sirius is so in love. “You’ve gone and gotten yourself a proper mid-Atlantic accent, haven’t you Pads?” Sirius shrugs one shoulder noncommittally; he honestly hadn’t noticed. “And nonsense, you know you’re always welcome here. I mean, you do _own_ the flat, for one thing.”

Remus is still smiling, and Sirius is confused. Isn’t he supposed to be angry at Sirius for leaving, or tearful, or annoyed with him for showing up unannounced, or _something_? This isn’t as dramatic as the stories made him think it would be.

“We’re all still standing at the door,” Benjy points out good-naturedly, “why don’t you come in?” 

He seems to really mean it, too. All of this is baffling. 

***

Benjy and Remus have a quiet conversation to the side as Sirius takes his shoes off and does his best not to eavesdrop. It’s decided that Benjy will go home ( _he doesn’t live here?_ ) and give the two of them some time to catch up, then there’s a bit of a dead time while Remus makes tea and Sirius makes awkward small talk with Benjy, and then the kettle whistles and Benjy leaves with a peck on Remus’s cheek.

Tea in hand, Remus settles down on the couch beside Sirius.

“So… I suppose I should just jump right in.” He takes a deep breath. “Do you know anything about polyamory?” Sirius is thrown for what feels like the hundredth time today – this is really not the first thing he had expected to talk about with Remus – but he swallows his discomfort and confusion.

“Erm, having multiple lovers?” It’s a true bastard of a word, with a Greek prefix and a Latin suffix, but it’s no more difficult to parse for that. “I’ve heard the word before. I think… erm, I think it’s related to, like, hippie communes?” Sirius has no idea where this conversation is going.

“Right,” Remus says, “That’s a bit of a stereotype, I think, though I don’t actually know much about communes. But I think that if that’s your association with polyamory, you probably have some idea that everyone is just having orgies all the time, and that’s definitely not the norm.” He wrinkles his nose at the idea - unsurprisingly. Remus is probably the least exhibitionist person Sirius has ever met; an orgy would be like a living nightmare for him.

“Another thing you might have heard of is when three people all are in a relationship together.” Sirius panics internally, and it must show in his face, because Remus hastily adds, “No, no, this is not an underhanded way of asking you to date Benjy, I wouldn’t do that to you. Triads actually aren’t very common, at least among the people I’ve known, and I’m certainly not looking for one. It’s just the form of polyamory that many people are most familiar with - I think because it’s the easiest to understand, if you’re used to monogamy. People can think of it as just a ‘normal’ exclusive life partnership, but with three people instead of two, and that’s easier for them to swallow. It’s like how people are always asking lesbians who ‘wears the pants’ in the relationship, or how they’re creepily inquisitive towards gay couples about who’s on top during sex.”

Sirius nods vigorously, because finally, there's something in this conversation he can understand. 

“Anyway, most poly people are in the middle of those two extremes - a stable, exclusive triad on the one hand, and, like, constant sex parties on the other hand.”

Remus sighs and runs a hand over his face.

“I’m not doing this well at all, I’m sorry. What I’m trying to say is, I’m polyamorous.”

Even though this is clearly where the conversation has been leading, Sirius is still surprised. Remus never dated _anyone_ at Hogwarts, even before the two of them got together. He would always politely turn down propositions and discourage advances, behavior that resulted (as Sirius later learned) from a combination of deep personal insecurity and fear of being outed as a werewolf. The idea that Remus has let someone that close - _multiple_ someones, even - is more than a bit of a shock.

“Okay,” Sirius says slowly, “so... what does that mean?” _What does that mean for us?_ , he doesn’t say.

“Basically,” says Remus, _and surely he must be thinking the same thing, right?_ , “it means that I date multiple people. I have two girlfriends and a boyfriend right now. They all know about each other, and while none of them happen to date each other, they’re all on friendly terms. And if there’s ever something that affects all of us, like an STD scare somewhere in the polycule, then we’ll all be involved in that conversation together.”

Sirius nods, and hums for Remus to continue.

“I tend towards a more hierarchical type of poly, which for me means that I distinguish between ‘primary’ and ‘secondary’ relationships. There are a lot of people who don’t like those terms, but—” he shrugs “—they work for me. Primaries are generally along the lines of what you might call a ‘nesting partner’ - a person you’re going to live with, maybe marry and have kids with; or maybe you have an agreement that you’ll prioritize that partner over all others in certain situations. But, none of those things are requirements. And you can have more than one primary at a time - maybe you split your time equally between two homes or maybe you all live together in a V or a triad. You can also get in situations where someone is your primary but you’re not theirs, but erm, that’s a bit in the weeds. Anyway, secondary-type relationships tend to work better for me; they can be just as committed and just as intimate, but they come with… let’s say, fewer expectations.”

“So you…” Merlin, Sirius has no idea how to use these terms. “Your relationship with Benjy is secondary-type?” The next words stick in his throat, but he summons his Gryffindor courage and says: “You don’t have a primary relationship right now?” 

_Do you not want one?_ , he doesn’t ask.

“I don’t,” Remus affirms. He looks right at Sirius, and Sirius knows he’s seeing straight through his careful wording, Occlumency shields be damned. “I haven’t lived with a partner since you.”

 _Oh._

Sirius looks away, trying to tamp down on the hope that’s flared up in his chest. He can’t just charge into this blind like he did when he was a teenager. This is too important for that. Remus is too important.

He’s not quite ready for that conversation yet, so he forces himself to change the subject.

“How did you decide… or, I guess, what’s good about being polyamorous?"

Remus shrugs. “It’s different for everyone. For me, it’s… well, you know back when we were… how I was afraid of tying you down?” Sirius nods. “Well, now, with this, I can have love and intimacy without the expectation of going on the relationship escalator with any of my partners. It’s not a problem for a relationship that I have no career prospects, if I never expect to entangle my finances with theirs. I’ve even dated people who never found out about my lycanthropy, because the relationship was low-touch enough that I could just schedule things to avoid the fulls. 

“Another important aspect,” Remus continues, “is that I just really like all of my partners. And I love that I don’t have to pretend that I only like one of them, because honestly that’s just not how it works. I mean, look at pretty much any story and you’ll see a hero or heroine torn between multiple love interests; as just one example, in _War and Peace,_ characters straight up say things like, ‘I wish I could just marry them both.’ It’s completely normal to have feelings for more than one person at a time. And sure, in the 19th century it made sense that you had to choose one, because it was tied to all these things like wealth and titles and children. But with those things out of the picture, what’s the point in forcing people to choose?”

Sirius is startled at how much sense that makes. 

“I never thought about it that way,” he says honestly. “I mean, the way I was raised, marriage _was_ about wealth and titles and all that, but that’s not… it’s not like I ever held to that myself. I guess it just didn’t occur to me, that it could be different.” Merlin, he’s usually more eloquent than this, isn’t he? “People… people seem to like monogamy?”

“Yes but _why_?” Remus presses, with that same spark in his manner that he always got when arguing about the proper way to execute a particularly complex prank. “Arguably, a lot of the time their reasons don’t really hold up to close scrutiny. It’s one thing to make a choice to be monogamous, but almost everyone is just doing it because it’s the default; most people haven’t ever actually thought about it. Back before we had modern medicine and condoms and all sorts of birth control, there were lots of contexts where it made perfect sense to want to be sexually exclusive. But now? Now I think most people just get jealous because they’re socialized to believe that they’re supposed to. To me that seems as absurd as demanding that someone only have one friend. It’s not like their friendship means any less just because they have other friends too.”

Sirius leans back, and Remus immediately stills.

“I’m so sorry, I’m just throwing all of this at you all at once and I’m… I’ve become so steeped in poly culture over the past few years that I don’t think I’m being sufficiently sympathetic to your experience as someone hearing about it for the first time. Especially because it’s not… it’s not like this topic is purely academic to you.” 

Sirius is still not quite ready to look Remus in the eyes as he says that.

“It’s all right,” he says phatically. “I’m just… I just need a minute to process.” 

“Of course,” says Remus, and he remains quiet for as long as Sirius needs, just like he always has.

Sirius squeezes his eyes shut and tries to think. He can’t think of any flaws in Remus’s arguments, but he knows from experience that someone being better at arguing than he is doesn’t mean that they’re right and he’s wrong. He simultaneously finds himself swayed by Remus’s arguments and viscerally put off by the idea of dating more than one person. He’s so confused and it’s all so much to take in, and it’s so very much not what he had expected upon coming here. It means there’s still a chance to be with Remus, to live with him and make a life with him. But it will come at a cost – Sirius will need to make concessions, and things will never go back to the way they were before, not really. Will Remus have sex with other people in their bed?

 _Their bed_. Sirius is suddenly painfully aware that he’s getting ahead of himself, and he opens his eyes. Remus is still sitting where he was before, close enough to touch but not touching. He’s watching Sirius and he looks concerned, but Sirius can’t tell about what.

“So...” Sirius casts about for a safe topic. “So you said you really like your partners. That’s, erm, they... can you tell me about them?”

Remus lights up at the question, and Sirius tries to ignore the way that tears at his chest. 

“Well, you’ve just seen Benjy, obviously. We’ve been together for about a year now. We share a lot of interests and have pretty similar personalities - we’re both introverted and sort of… placid, I suppose you could say. I spend the most time with him out of all of my partners; mostly we just go over to each other’s flats and read next to each other, or talk about what we’ve been reading. It’s nice to have someone to just spend time with passively. But I think I probably wouldn’t date him if I were monogamous, because I think it would be really easy for me to stagnate in a relationship with him, y’know. Become complacent.

“Tonks is the complete opposite. She’s just always on; no way could I keep up with her if we were primaries. But I love that she drags me out of my shell and gets me to do things I’d never do otherwise, like sightseeing in my own city, or salsa dancing. She’s just so excited about the world, and it’s infectious. I’ve always had a propensity to get mired down in day-to-day concerns, so it’s a real breath of fresh air to get to see things from her perspective sometimes.

“And Hestia - I’m sure you’ll love Hestia, everyone does. She’s just... so warm and full of light. I only see her a couple times a month since she’s got a lot on what with her work at Mungo’s and having six other partners, but I don’t love her any less for that. We spent more time together at the beginning, which was important for me in establishing closeness, but I’m not unhappy with how things have ended up. And I started dating both her and Tonks around the same time, nearly two years ago now. They’re the ones who introduced me to…” he waves his hand, “all this.”

Remus launches into an anecdote about the first time he met Hestia, and Sirius watches him, dozens of emotions vying for control inside of him.

It’s obvious that Remus is really, genuinely happy. The fondness with which he talks about his partners, and the conviction he has that polyamory is right for him. Sirius can’t help but be happy and proud that the person he loves has found contentment, and yet he can’t help but be sad that that contentment doesn’t include him.

He doesn’t know how he can fit into this new life of Remus’s, and that’s not even taking into account the more fundamental question of whether Remus even still wants to be with him after all these years apart. Sirius has always worried he wasn’t mature enough for Remus, and he fears that the past three years have only widened that gap.

But for the moment, as the conversation devolves into something more casual, Sirius tries to put his fears aside and just enjoy the fact that he gets to talk with Remus for the first time in three years. He lets Remus’s lilting voice wash over him; laughs at his jokes and pokes fun at his turns of phrase. He enjoys being back in his old flat, and being close enough to Remus that their knees accidentally brush when one of them shifts position.

After all, this might have to be enough.


	3. The Funeral

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sirius attends his adoptive parents' funeral.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't mean to write this chapter and I don't know how to make it fit into the rest of the story tone-wise, but I thought the funeral itself needed to be addressed.
> 
> CW for funeral/parental death, and panic attack (sort of).

The Potters' funeral is held in the church at Godric's Hollow - perhaps a strange choice for an entirely magical service, but Sirius appreciates the solemnity. The vaulted stone ceilings remind him of Hogwarts, and he's thankful for the way people's hushed voices get lost in the distant corners. James is occupied with receiving condolences from a never-ending line of strangers, and Sirius feels a guilty stab of relief that he was never legally a Potter. Instead of greeting old women he doesn't know, he gets to stand out of the way, looking up through a window stained with iconography he doesn't understand and feeling lost.

He doesn't know how long he stands there, his mind floating along with the motes of dust suspended in the still air.

Someone touches his arm. He turns.

Remus is there, hair golden in the early morning sunlight and face somber - not affectedly so, but genuinely, just like everything Remus does. He's so beautiful and Sirius wants to cry. 

Someone who knew him less well would have asked how Sirius was feeling, offered their condolences, or else tried to cover their avoidance of the subject with inane small talk. Remus just steps up by Sirius's side and joins him in staring up through the window. 

Sirius leans his head on Remus's shoulder, because life is too short for anything else. Remus shuffles closer and his weight is grounding; he keeps Sirius from floating away again. 

***

The service is beautiful, for the most part, and Sirius hates it. James breaks into hysterical laughter during the eulogy and Lily has to finish it for him, with James standing next to her the whole time with bowed head and shaking shoulders. Sirius grips Remus's hand tightly in his, feeling a mixture of embarrassment and revulsion fight its way up through the fugue-state fog of his mind. Remus grips his hand back.

Later, they follow the procession to the small graveyard out back and watch two ornate boxes be lowered into the ground. Sirius is glad he never had to see the corpses, and then, as the dirt begins to fall, he's suddenly terrified because he never will. Heedless of the continuing ceremony, heedless even of the attention it will bring, Sirius breaks and runs.

***

Remus finds him a few minutes later, crouched in a cold stone alleyway with his head in his hands and his knees pulled to his chest. His breath is coming fast and his thoughts aren't working right, and he's cold everywhere except where his hot tears are touching him. The presence of another person makes him want to scream, but he simultaneously wants to reach out and cling to Remus like he's drowning, which maybe he is.

"Sirius, love." Remus doesn't touch him. That's probably good. "Do you want to go home?"

A fresh wave of pain washes over Sirius, and he curls himself even tighter around the sobs that are punching him in the gut. 

"Don't–" he chokes, "I don't h-have a h-home."

"Oh, Sirius." Sirius feels that he's supposed to be attending to Remus's feelings, that Remus is probably sad too, but there's too much else going on in his head and it crowds out all rational thought. 

"I can side-along you to our flat, love. Do you want that?" Sirius can't respond. "If you want that, just… lift a finger, or something?"

It takes a while for the words to get through to Sirius, and longer for him to realize that he can't just stay here in this public alleyway all day. He's wrapped as tightly around himself as he can be, tense and self-protecting, and he doesn't want to let go. Painstakingly, he prises his little finger up from where it's clutching his bicep, and Remus understands.

"All right, love." He hooks his pinky around Sirius's own. "Let's go."


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sirius tries to adjust to being back in London.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another short chapter, because every time I sit down to write the end, I realize another thing that needs to happen before we can get there. (I don't outline, not out of principle but just out of... not doing it.) This time, I realized two things. First, that Sirius tried to get over his brother's death by cutting off everyone who loved him for three years, and he is really not okay. And second, that I'm trying to portray polyamory accurately and honestly, and although I find it natural now, it was actually quite emotionally difficult for me early on, especially because of my pre-existing feelings of insecurity and inadequacy. It would be wrong for them to just live happily ever after without ever addressing that.
> 
> CW: Eating disorder (brief mention), general depression and self-destructive behavior.
> 
> Thanks for reading <3

Sirius sleeps in Remus's bed that night, after a fraught and exhausting day of processing his feelings, culminating in a long and heartfelt letter to James that he sends off by owl just before midnight. He feels stripped bare and emptied out, hopeful that things will change. But when has it ever been that easy?

Waking up in bed with Remus the next morning, Sirius feels one split second of warm, familiar contentment. But the moment he thinks about raising his arms to pull Remus close, he remembers that he can't do that anymore, and all his feelings of isolation and inadequacy from the past three years (from his whole life, if he's honest with himself, but he isn't) come flooding back into the center of his chest, replacing that warm contentment with cold, hard pressure. He rolls over, gets out of bed, and leaves the room before Remus wakes up.

***

In the days that follow, Remus makes it very clear that this is still Sirius's flat, and that he can stay indefinitely – or even kick Remus out, if that's what he wants. (He doesn't.) Sirius moves into what used to be the guest room, because sleeping in Remus's bed was just a fluke, and it's not like that room is his anymore anyway. No, he's back in the flat where Remus loved him, but they don't wake up together, don't play-fight over the crossword in the mornings, don't spend sleepy Sunday mornings making breakfast in their underwear and kissing for so long that they let the pancakes burn. They don't speak much at all, in fact (Sirius worries that it's because his own closed-off body language, but he doesn't know how to change it), and they certainly don't kiss. Sirius feels like a tourist in his own past, one who speaks with a funny accent and doesn't understand the dating culture and trips over cracks in the sidewalk that everyone else knows are there.

Remus is unfailingly kind and warm and welcoming, and seems genuinely happy to have Sirius back in the flat, but he's also… distant? It's like he's trying to give Sirius space, waiting for him to make the first move in deciding his own future, but that's horrible. Doesn't he know that Sirius  _ can't  _ make those decisions? That he can't make the first move in communicating what he wants? And isn't that, in itself, most of the problem? 

And so the days go by, and Sirius spends them in the flat feeling agitated, or walking about London feeling agitated, and dodging his friends' requests to spend time with him. He has no reason, financially, to get a job, and it's been too long for him to re-enter healer training without having to re-apply. He visits his old motorbike in storage and realizes he has no idea what features he was working on when he left, and isn't even sure he'd remember how to work on the bike without blowing it up. Sometimes he feels like he wants to go flying, but there's nowhere in London where he can do so, and flooing to James and Lily's, where there's plenty of flying space, is too stressful to even contemplate. So he whiles his days away mostly waiting for them to end, and feels, if possible, even more lost than he did back in America.

Remus, on the other hand, lives a life so wholesome and productive that Sirius feels even worse by comparison. He's found a job that he clearly loves – his work hours are flexible enough that no one notices the moon, and he spends his days flooing to libraries around the country in search of obscure books, poring over the books when he finds them, and typing his research up on a muggle laptop (his fingers move so fast that Sirius isn't sure he isn't using magic).

And then there's the other part of Remus's life. There are the evenings out on the town with Tonks and the evenings in with Benjy. There are parties and coffee dates and even the odd visit from Hestia (who is, infuriatingly, just as perfect and wonderful as Remus made her sound). Worse than anything, there are the nights he doesn't come home at all.

Sirius feels deeply, animalistically possessive, then jealous when he remembers he's not allowed to feel possessive, then ashamed when he remembers he's not allowed to feel jealous. He ends up just feeling sick and confused and miserable. The first time Remus didn't come home, he waited up for him all night, staring at the door and feeling smothered by the silence in the flat, until he passed out on the couch at 4 in the morning. After that, he just takes to disappearing whenever he knows Remus will be with one of his partners.

Sometimes he walks and walks late into the night, long past when he should be asleep. Other times he finds a seedy club and revels more in the migraine it gives him than the lustful looks he gets (they never make him feel wanted). Sometimes he sits alone in restaurants and eats until he throws up. Always the destructive over-indulgence, something it's far too easy to find even after swearing off drugs and alcohol. He's not sure why he does it – if it's some kind of self-punishment, or if he hopes that Prongs or Moony will notice and take pity on him and help him because they realize he can't help himself, or if some part of him thinks it will feel good this time – but he does it all the same. At least it gives him a physical sensation to focus on, something to think about besides Moony, in bed with someone else.


End file.
